Patterns without a popular difference

Abstract: Which finite sets

P s u b s e t e q m a t h b b Z^{r}

with

| P | g e 3

have the following property: for every

A s u b s e t e q [N]^{r}

, there is some nonzero integer

d

such that

A

contains

(a l p h a^{| P |} - o (1)) N^{r}

translates of

d c d o t P = d p : p i n P

, where

a l p h a = | A | / N^{r}

? Green showed that all 3-point

P s u b s e t e q m a t h b b Z

have the above property. Green and Tao showed that 4-point sets of the form

P = a, a + b, a + c, a + b + c s u b s e t e q m a t h b b Z

also have the property. We show that no other sets have the above property. Furthermore, for various

P

, we provide new upper bounds on the number of translates of

d c d o t P

that one can guarantee to find.

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